UOnce upon a time we were all coaches of the national football team, now we have all become criminologists. The Italian is like this, first a navigator, saint and poet and now an international expert in DNA and forensic evidence. There is no time of day or night in which it is possible to turn on the TV without running into someone who explains to you why fingerprint 33 is fundamental in deciding the identity of Garlasco’s murderer.
If you are passionate about the topic but can no longer stand these amateurish approximations, once again literature comes to the rescue with an intriguing noir by Daniele Mencarelli. For the truth Four alleged family members (Sellerio) is not just a noir but a beautiful dark novel by the writer of Everything asks for salvation of which many of you will have seen the television series.
The story is set in Latina which some still call Littoria as in the times of fascism and among the architecture loved by nostalgics and the surrounding countryside a mystery takes place involving three families.
Serena Dandini (photo by Gianmarco Chieregato).
In a forest the skeleton of a woman dating back several years is found and after an initial investigation, Marshal Damasi and Officer Circosta narrowed the search for possible relatives of the victim to four alleged family members who had reported a female disappearance precisely in the period hypothesized for the death.
“Four alleged family members” by Daniele Mencarelli (Sellerio).
It concerns a couple of parents whose daughter has disappeared, an elderly lady who believed her sister had run away for love and a young man who had lost his borderline and drug-addicted mother. Whose relative will the mysterious death be? To find out we will have to wait for the scrupulous DNA examination and while they wait the unusual quartet is hosted in the town at the expense of the municipality.
Adding to the characters of this almost theatrical scenario is Brigadier Liberati, a bad guy who exploits prostitutes and takes advantage of the uniformtolerated due to inertia or a total lack of positive energy by the officer Circosta who will be responsible for managing the family members in this suspended time which turns out to be an excellent narrative ploy.
It will be the indolent and unmotivated young officer who weaves together the threads of existences pierced by pain and crossed by sad passions, leading us to an ending that naturally we will not reveal. The path and the souls of the protagonists who almost compete to win the identity of the disappeared allow Mencarelli’s ability to weave a leaden story of the Italian province in which we can all see ourselves.
All articles by Serena Dandini.
iO Donna © ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
